


Remembering a Daughter

by JebWritesStuff



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Angst, Gen, Memory Alteration, Memory Loss, Sad Ending, Unhappy Ending
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-06
Updated: 2020-08-06
Packaged: 2021-03-05 22:00:08
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,090
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25742470
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/JebWritesStuff/pseuds/JebWritesStuff
Summary: Wendell and Monica Wilkins are happy as any couple could be, living their dream in Brisbane, Australia. When visions of the past disrupt this calm existence, Wendell and Monica are forced to confront a memory of their lives - a life that they don't remember living.
Comments: 10
Kudos: 22





	Remembering a Daughter

_ October 1999 _ _  
_ _ Brisbane, Australia _ _  
_ _  
_ Wendell Wilkins was the very picture of a content man. He had a beautiful wife, a high-paying job as a top dentist, and he’d finally realised his lifelong dream of moving to Australia- he’d never been happier in his life. Ever since he’d left England two years ago, he’d felt free, unencumbered. Make no mistake, work was just as hard in Australia, and he was still part of the rat-race of commuters driving his little Toyota to the office everyday, but Brisbane felt more like home than Cambridge ever had. Smiling to himself, he flipped the Corolla’s indicator light on and pulled off the M7 onto Highway 41, back to the little two bedroom bungalow he shared with his wife Monica.    
  
  


Suddenly, as he turned into Sinclair Street, there was a blinding pain in his head, like someone had turned on a lamp that was too bright, and he nearly spun the car into a lamppost. He hurriedly pulled over, cursing and gritting his teeth, and waited for the visions to play out.   
  


  
Wendell and Monica had been receiving these ‘visions’ (for lack of a better term) since May last year. At first, they had been few and far between: perhaps a memory of when they’d met at university, or a view of a fuzzy hospital bed. But since December, the visions had ramped up in intensity and frequency: a burning castle in a torched valley, cloaked figures firing green lights, and a strange ginger-haired man leaning over him, wiping something with a cloth. But this vision was different. It was preceded with a dull ache in Wendell’s chest, like somebody had punched him in the stomach, and he doubled over in the car seat, eyes streaming. Then, like somebody had turned on a projector, the vision swam into view.   
  


  
He was with Monica, sitting in front of a tent in what he recognized as the Forest of Dean at sunset. The jumper she wore was one he’d given to her for Christmas 1986, and the weather was brisk, although slightly warmer than he’d expect for a winter evening. Wendell guessed this vision was taking place on one of their camping trips in maybe March or April 1987. Everything looked normal - so why did everything seem off? He glanced around, confused, and at that moment a little girl pushed her way out of the tent flap behind him, carrying a small glass jar. 

  
  


Wendell was more than a little shocked - he and Monica had never had any children of their own, and none of their nephews or nieces had the bushy, long mahogany-coloured hair or slightly buck-toothed smile that this child had. She looked, he realised, strikingly like pictures of a very young Monica he’d seen years ago. He caught himself thinking,  _ perhaps she is our daughter, maybe she was taken at birth. _ But she couldn’t be their daughter. That was impossible: Monica had been infertile for years, and they’d never adopted after that pain. Who, then, was this mysterious child? As he was pondering this, the little girl bounded over to him.

“Daddy! Daddy! I caught a firefly!” the little girl shouted excitedly, nestling her way onto his lap. He looked down at her face, shining with the boundless adrenaline of a body not wanting to admit it was tired, and felt a strange twinge of loss.   
_ Who is she? Do I know this girl?  _ Wendell wondered, desperate for some semblance of rationality. A little girl had never shown up in the visions before; why now?   
“That’s...uh...very nice. Can I see this firefly of yours?” he replied tentatively.    
_ Daddy? What?  _ Wendell wondered, utterly confused.   
  
  
At this, the girl grinned and held the little glass jar she was holding up to his face. There, buzzing under an assortment of holes she must’ve cut into the lid, was the firefly. It wasn’t a particularly pretty sight without its signature light, Wendell thought. It was a muted ochre in colour, with darker patches on its wings and a dull green bulb at the end of its body. He scratched his head absentmindedly, trying to remember when he’d last seen a firefly in the wild. Then it hit him.   
  
There were no fireflies in Britain.   
  


  
“How did you catch this firefly? There aren’t supposed to be any fireflies here!” Wendell asked, shocked. The girl slid off his lap and kicked a tuft of grass with her foot. She looked guilty, as if she’d hoped he wouldn’t ask, and Wendell felt a small pang of regret.   
“There was this ugly weed by the walking track, Daddy, and it looked so sad and crumpled up, so I wished for it to be pretty again and a firefly appeared where it used to be.” Her words tumbled over each other, as if she was confessing something evil, desperate to rid herself of the knowledge.   
“The weed turned into a firefly, so I scooped it up in the jar Mummy gave me to collect bugs and I wanted to keep it as a nightlight for the tent.”   
  


  
Wendell’s brain briefly entertained the thought of some unexplained magic that allowed his daughter to turn a weed into a firefly, but just as quickly dismissed it. This wasn’t a fantasy world, magic wasn’t real! His brain churned and buzzed, attempting to think of a _ rational  _ reason why a firefly would end up in Britain. Absentmindedly, he scooped the little girl up under the armpits and hoisted her onto his lap. She giggled; a sweet sound, a pure sound, and Wendell was dimly aware of tears on his cheeks.   
  
  


  
  
  


She looked up, eyebrows raised, and he realised he’d been crying in the vision-world as well.   
“Daddy, why are you crying? What made you sad, Daddy?” The little girl asked, confused and slightly desperate sounding. He opened his mouth, a reassuring phrase on his lips, when Monica strode over and picked up the little girl, shooting him a worried look. God, he’d forgotten how beautiful she was at night, how gorgeous she’d been on their honeymoon in Saint-Tropez, and his heart melted. Just a little.   
  
  
“Daddy’s just tired. The sun’s gone down now, and Mr. Firefly is all lit up; shall we let him go into the forest where he belongs?” Monica said soothingly, smoothing the girl’s hair and clutching her tightly to her chest. The little girl nodded solemnly and opened the jar. The firefly stayed motionless for a brief moment, then buzzed its wings for a second and alighted on the edge of the jar.   
“Go on, Lumos, go into the forest where all your friends live.” coaxed the little girl softly. “I’ll miss you, Mr. Lumos.” The firefly froze, as if it was considering her words, then took flight, its bulb illuminating a tiny path of light ahead of them.   
  


“Lumos? What does that mean?” Wendell found himself asking.   
The girl turned to him, her eyes shining, and for a second, Wendell could’ve sworn he saw the same look on her face in the house back at Cambridge.  _ Not possible, she never existed!  _ He futilely tried to remind himself.    
“Lumos is derived from the Latin lumen, which means light.” the little girl replied seriously. “That firefly, he’s a light, Daddy. A pretty, shiny light.”   
  
He nodded encouragingly at her, satisfied. They turned and watched the firefly go, the little girl, her beautiful mummy, and her daddy with the melting heart.   
  
  
After the firefly had faded into the horizon and the little electric lanterns had dimmed, Monica took the little girl’s hand and led her back to the tent.    
“Is it bedtime, Mummy?” the girl asked, eyes heavy-lidded with tiredness and steps weighted with sleep.   
Monica stroked the girl’s hair, burying her face in the curls. Wendell saw the glint of tears in her eyes, reflecting and refracting the light of the lanterns until her eyes turned into sparkling diamonds, multifaceted and infinite.   
“Yes, Hermione. You’ve had a very long and tiring day. Come on, get into the tent now; Mummy will read you a story before bed. Okay?” Monica whispered, almost too quiet for Wendell to hear. Her voice sounded raspy, emotional; luckily the little girl - Hermione - didn’t pick up on it, and simply nodded.   
_ Hermione. I always liked that name. My little messenger. _ _  
  
_

_  
  
_

Monica ducked under the tent flap and disappeared. Hermione turned and smiled sleepily at Wendell - her  _ Dad  _ \- and in that smile, a multitude of images flashed in front of him. A baby swaddled in a hospital-blue blanket, a toddler in a paddling pool, a little girl smelling a tulip, holding a suitcase and dressed in robes, leaving on a steam train.   
_ Hermione. _ _  
_ The name hit him like a ton of bricks. She was their daughter, his and Monica’s, but Monica was really named Jean, and he was Stephen, and they’d both been so happy to have a witch in the family…    
A great, ugly, heaving sob left his lips, his real lips, and he knew she was gone.    
  
His daughter, who he’d loved, lived with, laughed with, yet never known. The family they’d wanted, pleaded with all the gods for, yet always had.   
  
And Hermione was gone, and he’d never see the daughter he spent seventeen years bringing up.   
  
  
It was more than just grief, it was confusion (how had he never remembered that he’d had a daughter?  _ How?)  _ anger (why the hell had he been made to forget this life that’d he lived, but apparently never known?) and it was guilt (If only he’d known: could he have saved her? Found her? He didn’t even know where she’d been, or how she’d died!)   
But most of all, he felt a deep, dull grief, the kind that you could spend all your life feeling and never quite figure out. Wendell -  _ Stephen  _ now, as he was apparently known - folded in on himself in that car seat, and wept until his cheeks were scoured clean, and his eyes as dry as an empty well in the desert.   
  


  
He wasn’t sure how long he’d been crying, but it was late evening when the traffic officer rapped on the window. The sky outside was that rich, almost turquoise blue that preceded the deep black of night, and he could’ve sworn he saw fireflies in the gathering darkness. He reached over and opened the window.   
  


The traffic officer was young, maybe nineteen or twenty, with blonde hair combed in a side parting, and a fuzz of facial hair on his top lip.   
“Sir, I’m gonna have to ask you to move your car along now - it’s getting late.” the youth said, a friendly smile on his lips. Stephen looked at him, nodded and felt the sharp prickle of tears gather behind his eyelids.   
_ Ah, damn it. _ _  
_ The officer’s gaze filled with compassion and - was that pity? Stephen couldn’t tell.   
“You, er, all right mate?” the officer asked, eyebrows raised inquiringly.   
“Yeah. Just some bad news.” Stephen replied, curt and short.   
“Alrighty then, mate. Take care of yourself, yeah?” The officer slapped the roof of the Toyota and ambled back to his motorbike. Stephen put the Toyota in gear and drove off hurriedly. He didn’t want to be the subject of pity: his struggles were his, and his alone.

  
  


He passed Williamina Park, shrouded in darkness, trees and shrubs tucked away in the shadows. He turned right onto Heidelberg Street, where his home and his wife waited. Usually, he’d be happy to see Heidelberg Street after a long day at work, a reminder of home, of achieving his lifelong dream, but now he just felt...empty. He felt nothing. That life was a lie, somehow dreamt up to separate him from the knowledge of his daughter and his life before. He steered the Toyota into the drive of number 26 and turned off the engine, luxuriating in the silence.    
  


  
Suddenly, the porch light flickered on; Monica -  _ Jean  _ \- stepped out onto the driveway and saw him. Tears sparkled in her eyes, reminding him of that night, long ago in the Forest of Dean; that had been real, and they had both remembered. She’d cast away the burden, the cloak, that had been their lie of a life. They were both laid bare, raw emotions screaming out into the void, The void their daughter had left behind…   
  
He opened the door of the car and rushed out to her, enfolding her in his arms. They both cried, quietly but mournfully, for the life they had lost and never lived.    
  
The daughter they’d loved, but never known.

**Author's Note:**

> So, that was the first fic I've ever posted on AO3, and only the third fic I've written in tototal. I'm still new to the 'craft' of writing, so any comments or constructive feedback would be appreciated. Thanks so much, and have a lovely day!


End file.
